By: Serina Gousby

For the last couple of weeks we all heard about the government shutdown, which caused many federal workers to be furloughed as well as many historic landmarks and national parks to be closed. However, there was another deadline approaching that could really shake up the economy. According to the U.S. Department of the Treasury, the United States debt ceiling, also known as the debt limit, is the total amount of money that the United States government is authorized to borrow to meet its existing obligations, including Social Security and Medicare benefits, military salaries, interest on the national debt, tax refunds, and other programs. If the limit failed to be raised by the deadline, the government would default, which will cause many services and programs to a pause and unemployment will have a huge increase. The economy would soon be back in a much bigger hole, as it was while President George W. Bush was in office; maybe even worse as we are still recovering from that. For college students, many would potentially lose their private loans, credit cards, and have a harder time finding jobs after graduation.

Gladly, there is no need to panic anymore. On Oct. 17, President Barack Obama signed the bill that raised the debt ceiling from going to a default and ended the government shutdown. According to the Chicago Tribune, the House vote was 285-144 and the Senate vote was 81-18, which allowed President Obama to sign the negotiable bill just after midnight. In the morning, federal workers were allowed to go back to work and receive back pay. The bill did not affect the Affordable Care Act, which was the premise of the bitter argument between the Republicans and the White House that resulted in the government shutdown. It provides funding for the government to run through Jan. 15 and allows the debt limit to rise through Feb. 7.  However, if Congress fails to act early for the debt limit before February, the Treasury Department will have the tools and resources to extend the date temporarily.

With all of this political drama that has gone on through the month of October, I can easily imagine seeing this on an episode of “Scandal” or on a VH1 reality show. According to Time, the government shutdown cost the economy $24 billion; about $3.1 billion was lost in government services, and averages of $152 million was lost per day in travel spending, $76 million was lost each day because of closed national parks, and $217 million was lost each day in federal and contraction wages in the Washington D.C. area alone.

Also, we cannot forget about the incident just two days after the government shutdown began. A Connecticut mother tried to get in to the White House with her car because she believed that President Obama was monitoring her electronically; it ended up with the capital’s police tragically ending her life. Because of the shutdown, the police officers did not get paid for their heroic duty to protect and they did not deserve that at all. Additionally, it seems that Congress can only agree with each other at the last minute.

“Hopefully next time it won’t be in the 11th hour we’ve got to get out of the habit of governing by crisis,” said President Obama. You are absolutely correct Mr. President, Congress has to do better negotiating or the country will never function the way it needs to.